Is there somewhere you can meet me?
by margot-vitale
Summary: A collection of prompts and AU's for Alex Vause and Piper Chapman.
1. Chapter 1

_inspired by inkskinned's "Queen Bee"_

* * *

Larry, his name was. Larry was the boy who would be her Prince Charming. Who would woo her with promises of the world and more. He was everything the Chapman parents wanted. I was everything their fears consisted of.

The first time I met Piper Chapman, it was at the park in the late late night. I was 17 years old, she was 15 years young. I was swinging and she stood in front of me, and when I stopped she looked me deep in the eyes and whispered, "you're real, aren't you?" And I mean, I kinda understood because people in this town were made of paper and sometimes they were just like us as we were them and I sat beside her and said, "yeah, yeah I am," and she cried and cried and cried and admitted that she's never fucking sure anymore these days.

She would invite me to sleep over and in the dead of night we would sit together on the edges of her bed and we would talk about our childhoods, hers spent in dresses that felt like nooses and mine spent hiding from the monsters in my head. We would fall asleep with legs touching and hands placed gracefully on tummies and our hair undone and we would lock the doors and say "you're real, aren't you?" ever so lightly, loud enough for the other to hear, but quiet enough to not disturb the peace and I don't think we meant to become friends but we did, and we were

And one day, I saw Piper with the the boy would be her world because he was everything the good life was made of, and he brought a smile to her lips and all I could think was oh dear god oh no oh no and in the late late night we went out where the tulips bloomed and she picked one and put it behind my ear and I asked if she loves him and she couldn't answer she just couldn't

And her hands were cool to the touch but soft like a baby owl and her eyes were the blue of skies before the sun could shine through and her lips would speak words so eloquently and so beautifully and she held onto words as if they were her lifeline and when she read my poetry it always felt like i was being touched everywhere and when she danced for me, I forgot every reason I was sad in the first place, and we were two stars collding into one another and exploding on impact - I was at dances and parties and lunches and never happy until she stepped through those doors and even on nights when she had more important things, I got her all to myself under trees and the moon and

We were in the kitchen laughing and eating a cake our waistlines would hate but both of us pretending like we weren't living down the barrel of a gun and our laughter swelled to fill the empty spaces of our broken bodies and the counters and our faces were covered with flour and she was perched like a bird on the counter in this soft black dress and I slipped my body between her legs to reach for another mouthful and when she cupped my chin with her fingers she kissed me like she was the ocean and I was the wind and I felt my heart almost beat out of my chest and I had to back up and when we stopped touching, she blushed beet red and tried to find a reason but I couldn't listen to that I just couldn't so I kissed her hard and long and I put my hands on Her Majesty and I held her close to me, breathing in her scent and tasting her teeth and touching every inch of skin I've been holding myself back from discovering and we kissed and kissed and kissed and her tongue was hot and wet and i sucked her bottom lip into my mouth and her teeth nipped at my nape and chest and our dresses got in the way so we tore them off like they were layers of lies until it was just us naked, she and I, faces hot and flushed and hearts beating so loud we expected the cops to be called for noise complaint. Her body was so smooth and curved in all the right ways and she held me captive in her touches and the way she tasted was only matched by the way she writhed and we stayed up reinventing each other's ideas of heat, of lust, until it was early morning and we had to pretend we'd never done anything

And we took dance lessons and I wore her soft black dress and it reminded me of the way it felt when her hands were on my waist and at first, we just pretended like nothing was different, that it wasn't happening because it was all so complicated and I mean I knew she was using me to stop feeling so empty but jesus christ when she laughed I felt fireworks go off and the world explode and one day we were practicing and I jokingly partnered her and she paused and pushed my hair behind my ear and said "I love you" like it was the last secret she had to keep, I wrapped my arms around her form and we melted into one another and her hands were uncertain as they grazed against my skin and she ran kisses across my body and she slipped her fingers alongside the inside of my thighs and I ran my fingers through her hair and across her back and she inhaled the way I moaned under her and when her tongue found me I forgot we were supposed to be 'well-behaved' and I watched our reflections in the mirror as we ruined each other's good intentions over and over and over again.

The days ticked by like this, it became routine, we kissed when we were alone and were best friends when we were in company, and my fingers knew how to find the best parts of her in a split instant and on some nights we just laid, entangled in each other trying to explain away the tired, and on some nights we were estranged lovers and on some nights we didn't even talk, we just fucked each other so hard and so raw that it gave us something real to feel in the morning, cradling our bruises as war medals in a land of machines

And the days ticked by like this, and before he proposed to her he knocked on my door, and when I answered he frowned at me and said, "I don't know what she'd like for a ring." And I said, "it figures" and he laughed about it but I didn't mean it in any way that was good, I wanted each of my words to pour like poison down his throat and burn his insides until there was nothing left but acid and I helped him pick out a ring I would have been proud of her to wear

And I went to her room that night and asked, "are you real?" and she said, "as can be!" and when I kissed her my hands couldn't stop shaking and I thought I was going to burst

Loving her was like loving nature, and the way flowers bloom, and loving rainstorms and hurricanes, and sunsets and sunrises and loving her was loving more than you ever thought possible and loving her was loving the moon, loving her was the one thing I felt pretty good at.

Their wedding was beautiful and I cried.


	2. Chapter 2

'I'm on the verge of tears because of a rude customer and you step in and stand up for me' AU

* * *

I just want to go home. Today has been the icing on the shittiest cake ever baked and my apartment may be small but it has a bed that I can crawl into and avoid everyone and everything.

I'm sitting behind the counter at the Kwik-Mart, it's like a 7/11 but shittier. Much shittier. Yes, I've said shitty a lot already. But that's my life for you. Shitty.

I've worked here for going on 7 months. Sometimes, it's quite alright and the easiest money I've ever made. But since my boss put me on day-shift it's like I was destined for bad days, and it's an ongoing struggle to keep my cool throughout the days.

I'm reading a magazine as I hear the bell above the door ring out and see a tall brunette walk through with a shorter blonde woman behind her. The shorter woman looks around and sees me and smiles the biggest smile, I didn't know if I should be thoroughly creeped out or not but she waved and hit her friend and her friend looks at me and god... her eyes are the prettiest color I've ever seen. They're really bright, too. With black-rimmed glasses over them, and she's smiling at me, well, more of a smirk really. And she throws a little wave to me and they carry onto the snack aisle.

And I'm trying to keep my cool, you know? I've worked here for a long time, I see all kinds of women come in here (not any that looked as hot as she does) and I shouldn't be focusing on how her clothes are very fitting and she has curves in all the right places and her ass is...

 ** _Ding._**

An older man walks in to the Kwik-Mart and goes to the liquor shelves and grabs a couple of them and sways over to the counter, but not before dropping one of the bottles to the floor. Not accidental in the slightest, he more or less held out the bottle and let it fall from his hand while looking directly at me.

"Clean that up. Is anyone with a brain even working here?" He spits out, and I didn't know how to even react, how am I supposed to when this disrespectful dude walks in and destroys property?

"Uh.. I.. I'm sorry, I-"

"CLEAN. THAT. UP. How do you ever expect a man to want you if you can't even do your fucking job right? Bitches I tell ya. Never listen." He says as he drops the other bottle with it too and walks up to the counter with a hard glare on his face.

I'm not going to lie, this scared me to no end. I just wanted to go home. I just wanted to bury myself so far into the ground. I wanted to cry. I was on the edge of tears moving from behind the counter to go clean the mess up when I feel an arm gently move around me and push me away from the man and the mess. The arm goes as quickly as it came and it's the hot brunette from while ago, I didn't even know they were still here, and she goes and pushes the man into the counter and punches him square in the nose.

"You don't fucking waltz around and disrespect women, how would you like it if you got pushed around, huh?" She's pushing him into the wall and I thought he was going to hurt her, but she stood a few inches over him and intimidated him enough to where he struggled to open the door and ran out to this truck.

I didn't realize I was crying or shaking until I felt my hot tears hit my cheek and I laid against the wall, on the floor, paralyzed by whatever just happened to me. The blonde busied herself with cleaning up the alcohol, mumbling about how much of a waste that shit was, as the dark-haired woman came to my side and wiped my tears from my cheek and asked if I was okay.

"I don't even know..what to say..thank you. You have no idea how much you saved my life. Just thank you.." I buried my face into her shoulder and cried, and she let me. She told her friend to put the closed sign up and soothed me with soft touches on my back until my breathing finally steadied.

"Who are you?" I asked her, clueless to who exactly these women were and why they would do such a thing for me.

"My name is Alex. My friend's name is Nicky. We were planning on staying in and having a horror movie night and it wouldn't have sufficed if we didn't have snacks, so here we are." She smiles a genuine smile and is absentmindedly playing with my hair.

"I'm sorry I probably seem so pathetic, on the floor crying because of some rude man, but I haven't had the best week and that was the candle on the shit cake of my life." Why the hell am I babbling? I just cried into this woman's shoulder for too long, she's been through enough. I stand up and go towards the counter and bag their snacks and hand it over.

"You... know you didn't actually check those out, right? You just kinda threw them in the bag." Nicky asks out of confusion, and Alex's brows are furrowed as well.

"Yeah, I can kinda tell. You don't have to pay for them, you've done more than enough. I don't need your money. I hope this can be enough to repay you both for cleaning up my mess." I say and chew on my lip, and try to smile.

"That's very sweet, pretty lady, but wouldn't you get fired for just handing out snacks to random people who walk into your store?" Alex says, with an eyebrow raised, and fuck if that's not the hottest thing I have ever witnessed.

"Honestly, at this point I hope I get fired, I would love nothing more haha," I look up into green-blue eyes, "Seriously, just take it." I smile genuinely at her and Nicky and then turn to walk off but Alex grabs my hand.

"Come with us."

"What? Are the alcohol fumes getting to you?" I look at her genuinely confused.

"Haha no! Seriously, come with us. Leave a note on the counter and say you fucking quit. Lock up, put the keys some fucking place and come watch classic horror movies with us, eating snacks and drinking a lot of tequila. You deserve this. No one likes shit cakes. Fuck, I'll make you a fucking cupcake when we get there. Are you in?" Alex looks at me with the biggest eyes and she's smiling and caressing the back of my hand with her thumb. "Please?"

"You don't even know my name, Alex. And you both don't even know me, why would you want me around any longer than you already have had to?" I say as I stroke her arm and try to smile like I'm not about to cry at the gentleness of it all. At how she actually cares about me.

"Well, your name is Piper!" She shouts as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"How the fuck did you..." I look down and see my name tag and oh god, maybe I do need a drink.

"Okay, you got me. Let me lock up, and I'll meet you guys outside?"

"You got it, skippy!" Nicky chirps as she grabs the bags of snacks and jets out the door to the car.

Before Alex leaves to wait outside, she holds onto my hand and puts her free hand on my cheek and kisses me softly. "Thank you, pipes." She smiles and walks out the door and I see her sit on the hood of the car waiting.

After I get everything set, I lock the door and turn around to see a beautiful sight. Alex on the hood of her car jamming to Queen with Nicky in the car screaming the lyrics of Bohemian Rhapsody. I go up to the Alex and kiss her on the lips and throw my stuff into the car.

Maybe this was how my life was supposed to turn out.


	3. Chapter 3

Alex Vause has a tough exterior. She's cool and bad in all the right ways. She's very confident.

If you are the one she unclothes herself to, all blood and truth, the one she wouldn't hesitate to confess her deep, dark secrets to, confess to you how she feels, her in a vulnerable state, well, you are considered the lucky one. If she opens up her heart that she has guarded with brick walls and blades to you, you are the first and undoubtedly the only one to experience such a thing. Such a beautiful, remarkable thing. If you are the one Alex Vause is head over heels in love with, you will never know a love that could hold a candle to this one.

And Piper Chapman? Piper Chapman grew up as the popular and pretty blonde. She wanted to be the good in the world, when there was so much bad. She's always wearing a million dollar smile, even when she wants to curl into a ball and cry her heart out. She's also very confident, but her insecurities get the best of her a lot of the time. Her only dream since she could remember, was to be happy. Be happy and be with someone who feels genuinely for her, as she does them. And Piper Chapman got that. Because she was the lucky one who resides in Alex Vause's heart and home.

Ever since they met, they had an inevitable spark, and it showed, and it was magical. It started as a one-night stand, and then Alex called Piper for dinner at the most beautiful restaurant in all of New York. They would look at different places online, and venture out to find them and experience it for themselves than a bunch of critic reviews. The weeks were filled with work, work, and more work, but when the weekends came, they took full advantage of free time and spent it hand in hand, experiencing life. Their time even bled into the week, and Alex would pick Piper up from her late shift at work and they would go to her place to watch movies and eat pasta and make love until they were worn out enough to sleep.

They didn't exactly do things routine. Everyday was different. Some days they would go on adventures, some days they wouldn't get out of bed, some days the other was so sad they couldn't stop shaking or crying, but it was okay because they were together and they knew each other like they know themselves. Alex knew the right places to touch Piper and what happened when she didn't. Piper knew the stories of all of Alex's scars and why she's scared of other people's showers. They knew how to make each other feel safe. You can't cure depression by being with someone, but you can always still be there despite it, and help whenever you can.

Alex was known for throwing exceptional parties every now and then. The first time that Piper got to experience one, was 4 months into their relationship and it was New Year's eve. It was insane. There were a variety of people, and a variety of alcohol that Piper got lost in.

Around 11PM, Alex had already smoked two blunts, by herself, and was stoned out of her mind. She got off of the balcony and went to find her girl. She felt the urgent need to look at those baby blue eyes. A lot of people were gone, some were passed out on the floor and couches, too far gone to even notice it's almost 12, just like Alex. She finds Piper hugging a bottle of Tequila and watching the New Years countdown on TV. She gets lost in the beauty that is Piper Chapman and looks at Piper dreamily for a few minutes before finishing her walk towards her and sitting directly in front of her on the coffee table.

Alex cups Piper's face in her hands and holds it there and stares at her with so much love. "This is it right here. This is my favorite face of all the faces," and kisses Piper on the forehead and then on her nose. After giggling at the fact her red lipstick made two perfect lip-shaped marks on Piper's beautiful face, she wanders off.

Piper couldn't tell if she did that because she was high, or if she was in such a lovey mood but it made her blush deep red anyways. She looked in her phone and saw the lip marks on her face and threw her head back with a big grin on her face. She doesn't think she has ever been this happy and this in love before. Because she hasn't.

And right before the ball drops, she runs to the balcony and puts her arms around Alex's neck and kisses her hard. There's cheering, there's fireworks, there's so much noise but if you asked them what they heard when the clock struck twelve, they wouldn't have a clue because all of the background noise vanished and all that existed in that moment was Alex Vause and Piper Chapman. And it was the best damn thing they've ever known.

* * *

 _Note: Hi! It's your angsty Vauseman shipper bringing you a short little story and a bit of happiness. Thank you all for reading my stuff, and taking the time to follow/fave/leave reviews. I've been so stressed out with school that I haven't been able to update as much as I would like, but I haven't forgotten about this, or Ethereal, and I'm working hard on getting a schedule to update both of these regularly. But hope you enjoy this little bit because I seem to make everyone cry a lot. Love you. xo_


	4. Chapter 4

_I wake with the dawn. The sun is shining through the window of my tiny apartment bedroom like a bright neon warning sign._

 **(Dawn's breaking and what are you doing.)**

/

 _Seeing her again was the one thing I never thought would be possible. But there she is. Piper Chapman. She's walking from the bus stop on the corner and into the coffee shop I just finished ordering at. Now she's waiting in line and I'm at the side counter waiting for my coffee, but 10 of them could have been made and I wouldn't have noticed because all I'm doing is staring at her, in complete shock._

 **(Shock or disbelief. Same thing.)**

/

 _She's just as a beautiful as she's always been, but her blonde hair is not the long and wavy mess I remember. It's cut short, just below her shoulders, and I think she must have tried straightening it, because it's not as wavy as it used to be. Her face is like nostalgia._

 **(It's like freezing all your favorite memories and all you're familiar with, storing it away for years, and then all of a sudden you're looking at them again. At her again. Like there's a thick coat of dust on your happiness.)**

/

 _Now she's ordering her coffee and I'm too far away to hear anything but I know what she's ordering because I know what she takes in her coffee better than I know what I take in my own. My coffee is ready and I thank the barista and when I look up, blue eyes meet green. She sees me and her face lights up like it used to and her nose crinkles from how wide her smile is and it's like the armour I carefully installed around my heart just...shatters._

 **(It was never Piper-proofed. That much was certain.)**

 _We hello and hi and how are you doing and then we are sitting at a table together, talking over coffee._

 _Me; Works great. No cartel, settling shipments at a string of stores. Yeah, I still play guitar sometimes._

 **(That's a lie. Doesn't she know she took my harmony and rhythm when she left?)**

 _Her; School is just fantastic. She's loving her new city. Yes of course she still writes._

 **(Not true. Doesn't she know I can still tell when she's lying?)**

 _Oh and yeah our families are doing great._

 _/_

 _Unexpectedly the words blurt from her mouth before she catches herself;_

 _I miss you._

 _I miss you, I miss you I missyou miss but isn't that all I've ever been able to think since the moment she told me she had to leave?_

 _Apparently I still have no filter because I blurt out;_

 _Then why'd you leave_ **(Me)** _?_

" _I had to find myself," she says._

" _Right. You can find yourself when you're with someone else, but I just make it so fucking hard, don't I."_

 **(Do I keep you from who you truly are?)**

" _I miss you. I'm here now."_

" _But this isn't your home anymore"_

" _Well maybe I want to come home."_

 **(I think you're just afraid of being alone.)**

 _But I don't say that because she's looking at me and something in her oddly familiar eyes make me believe her for a moment._

 _/_

 _A moment long enough for me to invite her back to my apartment._

 _She sits on my couch and when I sit down next to her with two glasses and a bottle of wine, I notice the ring on her finger._

 _At first I think she's playing me,_

 **(Now here's the punchline: She's engaged again, and not to me.)**

 _But no, it glints in the candlelight and it's the same ring I gave her years ago. The same ring she wore for 6 months before things fell apart._

 _/_

 _The rest of the night is a blur of lust, of lost and found, tears and anger, and hope, and here I am lying in bed in the early hours and she's curled around me, like a missing piece of a puzzle. Where she used to lay, like always._

 **(Maybe she's just lonely. Maybe she finds comfort in the familiar. Maybe it's not love, maybe it was never meant to be.)**

 _But I couldn't just turn down the opportunity to try._

 _How could I lay next to the most beautiful girl in all the universe and just give up on the hope that we could make it work?_

 _Maybe the fire that once burned between us never really went out._

 _Maybe there was a tiny bit of flame, waiting for something to set it off again._

 _Maybe we are wildfire._

* * *

(wildfire / SJW)


	5. Chapter 5

**An I love you wasn't spoken, but I felt it.**

* * *

1

"You doing okay, kid?" Alex semi-yells over the crowd of people. We decided to go to the high school's football game because my friends wanted me to make an appearance and even though my friends and Alex aren't fond of each other and Alex doesn't even go to the high school anymore, we still show up together. Package deal, no refunds.

"Yeah, it's just..a lot of people in a cramped space is getting to me. No big deal." I try to give her a smile but the corners of my lips couldn't make the trip upwards and it was a failed attempt. But Alex slides her hand over my shoulder and leans closer so I can bury my face in her neck. Her hair smells like citrus and warmth and I lean into her. I wanted to be closer. I wanted to melt into her warm embrace until I couldn't hear anything but Alex's heartbeat and the steady flow of her breathing.

"Com'ere, babe." Alex says. When I move my head to see her properly, she puts her hands around my arms and positions me so I'm sitting in between her legs. She starts to play with my hair, which she knows always relaxes me no matter where we are. I space out for awhile, thinking about how I got to the place I am now, happily in love with my gorgeous girlfriend and accepted into the college of my dreams. I'm pulled out of my reverie when I start to notice the small tugs on my scalp. I turn my head and Alex looks bewildered.

"What did you do?" I giggle while touching my head, feeling an attempted braid (more like a bunch of knots) in my hair and Alex looking positively adorable with that pout on her lips.

"I don't know what happened, okay..I promise I know how to braid hair I just...your hair is REALLY against the idea. I also wasn't paying very good attention. I'm so sorry, I'll try to fix it."

I start to laugh uncontrollably despite the pressure on my head from the knots, and Alex starts to laugh with me and we're both doubled over with laughter while the crowd watches the rest of the game, unaware.

* * *

2

"...and I don't think that guy ended up alive. I bet your ass he died, and they just didn't show it onscreen, because wouldn't that be so fucking awful? The main guy who saves everyone else's ass gets murdered? Still a better ending than that bullshit, that's for sure." Nicky remarks about the movie we just got done seeing at the theatre. She came with her girlfriend, Lorna while I came with Alex for our usual double date, "let's go see a shitty horror movie".

Nicky and Alex are smoking cigarettes while we sit outside, Lorna's giving me the latest updates of her sister Frannie dating some douchebag, and it starts to get colder outside. I'm trying to listen while also burrowing myself further into my small jacket. Alex noticed my teeth chattering slightly after I made a comment, and she put out her cigarette and took her jacket off and draped it over my shoulders.

"Put your arms in so you can get the full warm effect, Pipes." Alex quips when I don't move so I put my arms into the holes and look down at myself, noticing how the jacket was too big for me.

"I look stupid, Alex." I jut out my bottom lip and look up at her.

Alex just laughs and agrees with me and I couldn't control the exaggerated eye roll that came after. She grins widely at me and I punch her in the arm. All she does is pull me close to her and kisses my forehead.

* * *

3

 _I'll pick you up from school today, back parking lot, on the dot. x_

The bell rang and I walked out towards the parking lot and saw Alex's car and I picked up speed.

"Hello, princess. You good to go?" Alex says with a lazy smile and a sloppy kiss to my lips. I nod my head and put on my seat belt and we're off.

We head to the burger shop and order burgers and shakes and sit on the green picnic tables outside. We talk about our days, and our plans, and at one point Alex asks me about the future.

"It's all coming so soon..I'm scared. I don't think I'll make it into Smith." Smith is the college I've always dreamed of going to.

"It's okay, babe. Because you know something? You're going to do big things. You're going to do so well no matter where you end up at and I will always be proud of you. Always." Alex looks me deep in the eyes with a smile that proves to me that she means every single word and I take her hand into mine.

"I'll always be proud of you too, Alex..always."

* * *

4

My clock was flashing at me. 3:57 AM.

Some nights, I won't sleep because the aching from the weight of my fears and insecurities are too much to bare and it's all I can do not to scream.

Tonight was one of those nights. My hands haven't stopped shaking in two hours but I controlled it enough to pick up the phone and dial the only number that means anything.

"Hello?"

.

.

.

"..Piper?...Pipes? What's wrong? Talk to me."

"...Al. I'm falling apart." I don't know how I managed to speak loud enough or coherent enough for her to understand me but I hear rustling on the other side.

"I'll be over in fifteen."

I see her car pull up eleven minutes later. I pull on a sweater and head out to her car, and when I get in the car, I broke. She held me as I sobbed and sobbed and sobbed into her shoulder. She held me until I stopped shaking and crying, and my breathing started to regulate. And she held me even closer when I felt okay. And when I started to shake from laughter, she kissed my face over and over again.


	6. Chapter 6

" _ **We can't touch the sadness we're all chewing on,**_

 _ **but we save a hard plastic seat for it every night."**_

* * *

They met each other for the first time on the train at 1 in the morning.

An unspoken question was asked, they wander together towards the closest McDonald's.

They share an order of fries and two milkshakes.

Piper pretends not to notice the cuts littering Alex's wrist.

Alex pretends not to notice the purple blooming bruises on Piper's knuckles.

They talk about everything and nothing, have political debates in dimly lit 24/hour ice cream shops.

In the early hours when everything is quiet, fill in the silence gaps with talk about wanting to leave this town and go somewhere.

They have that in common. Wanting to leave, but never making any plans. They might run out of things to talk about if they do.

Recently discovering their parent's homes are down the street from each other.

Alex's birthday comes and goes and her mom surprises her with a car of her own.

She picks Piper up instead of the train from here on out.

/

They're isolated in their own little world with just the two of them.

They drift towards each other because they're all they have and there's nowhere else to go.

Go to parks, and people-watch because strangers are interesting, much more interesting than people who know.

When Alex goes to pick Piper up at 4 AM, she doesn't question her wet cheeks. Only asks, are you hungry? Where do you want to go?

Piper was never one for pity, and Alex never had to ask to know that. She never gave pity in the first place.

They pick fights with themselves, a battle to see if they can survive.

The monsters in their heads always good sparring partners.

They never groaned about what the other did to try to stay alive.

Alex's cigarette habit was never a problem.

Piper's pill bottles littering the floor of Alex's backseat was never a problem.

Coping, they'd say but never do. They didn't talk about it.

/

They're used to having their own time, just Alex and Piper and the quiet rush of waves from the ocean nearby.

So when they get an invitation to a big party downtown, they were hesitant.

"Well, think of the story we'll have."

So they attend.

They never leave each other's side the entire night until Alex has to go to the restroom and tells Piper she'll be right back.

Piper meanders towards the bar, letting her fingers linger over the many poison choices.

A woman, not as tall as her, watches Piper from afar and slowly lets her feet glide her towards Piper, like a predator stalking their prey.

There's a smirk, there's a flick of hair and this woman, Tiffany, thinks she's got Piper wrapped around her finger.

But she doesn't know Piper at all.

No one does.

Piper's comfort level is deteriorating and she's more or less imagining how Tiffany's face would look after her fist collides with it.

Well… that was before Alex's fist collided first when Tiffany got a little too close for taste.

Piper doesn't say any words but the question is lingering even after Alex takes her hand and drags her outside to the car.

Piper doesn't say any words but Alex slamming the car door and the white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel answered any questions she may have had.

Alex wasn't good with sharing.

She was good at protecting what _they_ wanted to take.

/

Piper's parents fell out of love seven years into their thirteen year marriage.

Alex's parents never married, fell out of love before the word could be a thought.

Both set of parents rotted the same.

Piper's parents never fought.

Alex's parents fought more often than not.

At the end of it, their parents weren't people. They were mere ghosts of who they once were.

Another thing they had in common.

They didn't want to fall in love.

They didn't want to rot like their parents did.

/

Piper writes poetry.

Sad poetry, poetry about heartbreak and death.

Heartbreak and death.

Heartbreak and death.

Heartbreak and death.

If you say it enough times, it loses meaning, right?

Wrong.

They still mean all too fucking much, no matter what twist you add.

Piper never showed Alex her poetry, and Alex never asked.

Piper was asleep on the couch in Alex's childhood home, so Alex decided to clean out her car.

Crumpled up pages with a thousand pen strokes caught her eye.

She smoothed them out and read them, trying to identify what they are, if they should be thrown out.

She recognizes Piper's handwriting after she read through once, which made her read through another two times to soak.

She could feel the pain radiating through the page to her skin like the sun itself was beating down on her.

They don't talk about this.

They don't talk about the history that made them.

They don't talk about why Piper clings to Alex's shoulder every time there's a loud yell or a stranger too close for liking ( _but wait...isn't Alex just as much of a stranger as they are?)_ They don't talk about that.

They don't talk about the important matters. The important matters don't matter.

They pretend they're more friends than strangers, but they don't know each other like friends should ( _do they?)_ They don't talk about it.

They don't talk about how Alex is afraid of death but tries to kill herself. They don't talk about how Alex refers to it as "facing her fears head-on".

They don't talk about the amount of pills growing on Piper's plate every morning, how thin she's getting, replacing three square meals a day with Adderall to "soften up the razor sharp sucker punch of knowing we're all destined to be a humanoid horror movie".

They don't talk about it.

/

Until one day, they do.

The question appears when they're both the right amount of buzzed from the stolen liquor.

"What are we doing?"

At first, the immediate reaction was shock because Piper thought she'd be the one to ask that first.

Not Alex.

She doesn't think the question weighs any meaning so she doesn't reply for five minutes, doesn't even look up from her spot on the floor.

She thinks maybe the alcohol is getting Alex too deep in thought and she'll probably forget she asked that in awhile but when she looks up, Alex's eyes are so big. So wide, and so impossibly bright. She's looking down at Piper likes she holds the key of certainty.

"I thought we were...existing. We are, aren't we?"

Alex's eyes are getting a little wetter, and she shakes her head to the side and a hollowed laugh bubbles out of her throat.

"I don't think we can necessarily call what we're doing existing, Pipes. We're surviving, but this isn't a way to exist."

Piper chews her bottom lip, all too full of certainty that this was going to end with her gasping for breath on the floor and smelling smoke. She nods her head once, looks up with wide blue eyes, nods again for good measure. Because Alex is right. This isn't the way to exist. This wasn't a way to live.

"I don't know any other way, Alex. I'm awaiting my inevitable death. Once you get to that point, I don't think there will ever be a good way to live. You of all people know that just as well as me."

Alex bites the inside of her cheek and nods her head.

They sit in that position for seven minutes before Alex slowly makes her way to the floor next to Piper.

When she gets comfortable, Piper's head automatically goes to it's place on her shoulder.

"I think I love you, Piper."

Piper doesn't flinch for the first time.

She knew it would be said eventually.

Not because she believes everyone will love her, but because of quite the opposite.

She has always been a firm believer that no one will fall in love with her, because no one would even stay 22 months with her destructive behavior and hard knock sense of self.

Alex has been here for 36 months.

Yeah, she counts them.

"I believe you should be sure of yourself before choosing your poison, Al."

They never believed they would make it to the word, "love".

Piper believed they would hate each other quicker than they would've fell in love with each other.

But, that never happened.

They never opened up to each other at such a level because what would be the point if nothing was long-term?

Tonight, unlike other nights, makes them believe that maybe what they have is something good.

Something worth holding onto.

Something worth sticking around for.

"Piper, I love you."

An etch of a smile, blinking away tears before realizing she's been crying the entire time.

She leans her head up, looks Alex dead in the eye before Alex speaks again, practically reading her mind.

"Yes, it's terrifying. We promised ourselves we'd never make the mistake of falling in love. We won't turn into our parents if we don't choose what they chose. But, Piper, I never chose to fall in love. It happened and it's the only fucking thing I can't control. And I'm not going to apologize for it either. I love you."

"I love you, too."

They were sure that the words didn't even have to be said.

They were always better at communicating without words, anyways.

But the recognition.

Putting words to the feelings.

Expressing those feelings without fear of the other leaving.

Because they know, now, leaving isn't an option.

If they had to rot with anyone or no one, they would pick each other.

Every time.


	7. Chapter 7

Running.

It's what she knows how to do best. Ever since she was a little girl, Alex and her mom were drifters, never staying long enough in a city for them to get attached to anyone or anything. Always on the move. Always on the road.

/

When you spend your entire life running, something strange happens when you meet someone who makes you want to stay.

/

Alex's first fling, as she called it, was with Robin Nicks in 9th grade and Robin wanted her to be her first. She considered Alex special to her even though Alex was never interested in anything she had to say and most of the time chose getting high in club bathroom stalls than to stay for more than an hour in Robin's bed. Alex was everyone's dream girlfriend, and no one was Alex's. She came over to Robin's house at the stroke of midnight, snuck in through the back gate and into Robin's window. She slid her leather jacket off of her shoulders and threw it on the nearest chair. Crawling into the bed, she hovered over Robin, slowly taking off her clothes in silence, with only the sound of Robin's nervous breathing filling the room. Alex fucks her softly, bringing her to the brink and giving her release. She slowly takes her fingers out and gets up from the bed, wiping her hand on her jeans. While tying her boots, she hears the utterance of an "I love you" drifting to her ears from the far side of the bed. She looks at Robin, nods her head, slips her jacket back on and crawls out the window. It's the last time she's in that town and the last time she ever saw Robin. She shrugs it off and starts packing her essentials to get ready to move again.

/

She only does one night stands. A quick fuck in the back of a car or in a dingy $15 motel room. Never concerning herself with relationships or anything of that nature. Never concerning herself with anniversary plans or long trips to different cities or wedding bells or how they look in white. Never concerning herself with anything at all. She tricks herself into believing she's invincible, that she's fearless. Fear is too slow to catch her, always on the run. She never stays long enough to hear their heart crack in their ribcage as she's putting her clothes back on. She tells herself that nothing scares her and refuses to admit that commitment fucking terrifies her. On a stop in Pennsylvania, she chops her hair off and gets seven new tattoos, signs up for a bachelor's degree she had no intentions of actually committing to, all to prove she isn't scared of anything. She only stays long enough to mend the holes in her shoes, but never enough to graduate, or grow her hair out, or stop trying to scratch off those goddamn tattoos.

/

She wishes she could feel guilt for the people she's ruined along the way, she truly does, but guilt is too slow for someone like her and she tries to ignore the past, hoping to forget it even though it's grasping her by the neck and taking all of her oxygen.

(How many hearts can you break along the way and how many could you have mended if you just knew how to stay?)

She doesn't know and she doesn't give two fucks and she doesn't care to even think about it anyway. She sweeps up all the pieces of other people under the mat until it's time to move once again.

(How many cities have you tried to kill your memory in?)

She's become so dark and her skin is made of razors and the words "gentle" and "delicate" feel foreign to her.

She's in New York, the city she could never sleep in, the city that starved her. She grows her hair out, dyes it purple, dyes it blue. She impulsively gets 12 new tattoos. She kisses everyone that is no one and swears she's still not scared of anything. When you live your life running, you spend it drinking and smoking and speeding and snorting and pill popping and ignoring and ignoring and ignoring and dying, too. She fucks anyone to forget but she can't get out of her own fucking head long enough to hear them say they love her….

But they're all liars anyway, because how can anyone love anything as blurry as her?

/

See, when you spend your entire life running, something strange happens when you meet someone who makes you want to stay.

/

Her name is Piper. She has long wavy blonde hair with hints of brownish gold in it. Her eyes are crystal blue. They met at a house party thrown by some well known douche bag of Manhattan. Alex is snorting cocaine with a few girls on a sheet of glass. When she lifts her head up, she sees the brightest pair of eyes looking at her. They stare at each other for a few seconds, examining each other's facial features before they both look down the other's body and examine everything else. Alex licks her lips, Piper plays with a bit of hair and walks to the kitchen. They sit on barstools and have a proper introduction. They talk, they venture outside after their heads stop being so cloudy and they hold hands and walk to Piper's apartment complex. Once arriving, and taking a short flight of stairs to Piper's room, they slip in and get lost in each other for hours before falling into the most restful sleep either has had in years.

She starts getting scared of everything. The way she finds new things to do in the city that abandoned her. The way Piper says her name and the way her chest swells when they kiss in a way she knows it's not going to split. The way she finds comfort in Piper's weird sense of humor and the consistent banter and sarcasm that comes with it. The way she doesn't care what anyone thinks or the way this is the first one she's ever let mean something. The way she becomes a we instead of an I and the way she's been selfish her entire life.

When someone teaches you how to stay, you become scared of every god damn thing.

And then one day, you're fearless again.

She has her heart in Piper's hands and Piper's hands in her hair and she loves the way she looks in white.

/

When you finally learn how to stay, eventually the only thing you become scared of is forgetting. Her voice in the cold walking across the Brooklyn bridge saying "I'm going to remember this forever." Crying in a motel room 6 cities over because they were too drunk to be anywhere else but in that bed, in each other's arms, so in love she couldn't stand. Kissing her against the shelves of poetry and western religion in that bookstore cafe somewhere in Chicago. The way Piper said I love you for the first time as if she was exhaling. Her breathing seconds before she said it as if she had spent the last eight months holding her breath. Alex running her thumbs across Piper's wrist in that hotel with a view of a parking lot in Jersey. The way she wakes up by curling into her. The way her hands feel on Alex's face when the voices in her head won't stop yelling. The way her arms feel around her shoulders when the shivers come back. How soft Alex has become. How soft they are together.

/

 _\- It's decades from now, the doctor tells me I have Alzheimer's disease. I go home and think of her and all of these moments and repeat "please don't forget". I think of how soft she has let me be and I say "please don't forget" to the palms of my hands. I think of how she has forgiven every inch of my ugliness and whisper "please don't forget" to my clenched fists. I think of how beautiful we are and how beautiful she makes me and I beg, "please don't forget". -_

/

There is a reason for all of that softness inside of her, and if she forgets Piper, she forgets everything.

It's a recurring nightmare she has often. It's a fear that never caught up to her until she found a place to rest next to her.

/

When you spend your entire life running, something very strange happens when you meet someone who makes you want to stay.

You start wanting to remember everything.

* * *

a/n: inspired by a poem from a beautiful poet on twitter, the lines in italics are from Alex's point of view, hope you enjoy, thank you. x


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